


Once A Saint Took Pity On A Soul In Agony

by iamthefirebird (firebirdofthenight)



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Pirates, Depression, Javert is depressed, Pirates of the Caribbean fusion, Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt, digression on sailing ships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-30
Updated: 2014-03-30
Packaged: 2018-01-17 14:09:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1390627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firebirdofthenight/pseuds/iamthefirebird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For this prompt:</p><p>J/VJ, age of sail</p><p>"I chased a man across the seven seas. The pursuit cost me my crew, my commission, and my life."</p><p>Let's do a little spin on PotC, shall we? (former) Commodore Javert, anyone? And the wily former captain of the Royal Navy turned seafaring rogue Jean Valjean?</p><p>Bonus points for Javert taking a job aboard a less-than-legal ship as a last ditch attempt to put some money in his pocket (to be spent on drink), finally succumbing to the ever-present urge to end his disgrace, tossing himself overboard during a storm, and regaining consciousness back aboard the ship, only for the first thing he sees to be Valjean tending to him (because he was aboard the ship as well, don't you know, and happened to see the former commodore make a rather rash decision and decided to do something about it).</p><p>Double bonus points for the two of them looking out for each other during skirmishes like proper badasses.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally found here: http://makinghugospin.livejournal.com/11667.html?thread=2097811#t2097811

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS DEPRESSION, SELF-HARM AND A SUICIDE ATTEMPT.

The only sound was the faint slap of the gentle waves against the hull as Jean Valjean, ex-convict and parole-breaker, stood on deck. It was a beautiful night, the silvery moonlight transforming the rough ropes and worn wood into something ethereal, unearthly. Not a soul stirred; all were down below, making merry or catching what sleep they could. This blasted calm had been on them for two days now! He knew, logically, it was unlikely that the law would catch him - the ocean was vast, to say the least - but he had not stayed free all these years by being complacent. At least Cosette was safe, asleep in her (private) cabin. That was the only thing that mattered.

He sighed. His hasty departure would not have remained unnoticed for long. It had been the lesser of two evils, he reasoned; it was better to risk discovery in flight than to stat put and be certain of it.

Usually, he would gather a crew himself - but this time he had been forced to rely on whoever was available on such short notice. This was not ideal; there was no telling what kind of men these were. A worryingly large number had been recruited from various taverns, drunk beyond measure. They hadn't had the time to be picky. Nevertheless, behind the alcohol were some competent sailors; they'd set sail without a hitch.

Suddenly, a sound jolted Valjean out of his reverie. The familiar creaking of the fo'c'sle decking alerted him to the presence of another person. A man stood, leaning on the starboard gunwale, staring up at the distant stars. As he watched, the figure switched his gaze to the dark water below. He seemed to be lost in thought, as deep as the ocean he contemplated. Silent in the shadows, Valjean considered engaging this man in conversation - but something held him back.

Abruptly, the man seemed to come to a decision. Gripping the edge, he hauled himself onto the raised wood. He took a long moment to steady himself, standing tall against the backdrop of the night sky. Time slowed. Valjean sprinted across the deck, even as the figure dropped silently off the side of the ship.

\---

It had begun with a chance encounter. Some would call it providence, that he had been sent to the one town in the whole empire with a wanted criminal for mayor. He called it bad luck. The man had evaded him then, but Javert had had a duty to the law - and so he chased the elusive fugitive across the seven seas, his fixation earning him reprimand after reprimand. Every crime was a sign his nemesis had resurfaced; every criminal bore his face. Commodore Javert, they whispered in dark corners and alleyways. The crazy one. Kept seeing a long-gone ex-convict everywhere he went. His sailors, too, lost faith in him. They ceased to respect his command, didn't trust him to lead.

In the end, it had cost him his commission.

Unreliable, they called him. A liability. He had been the best, they said, but he was slipping. It was better to leave with dignity, before something went drastically wrong. They gave him his pension and sent him on his way.

He lasted three days before he went to the tavern.

Javert couldn't remember how long it took for the money to run out. He did odd jobs, sold most of his possessions and moved to increasingly decrepit lodgings until, finally, there was nothing left. He sat in the corner of a tavern, nursing his last mug of cheap rum, musing over how easy it would be to accidently bump into one of the richer patrons...they were so drunk, they surely wouldn't notice... NO! He would not; he must not! He had not yet sunk so low as to become a thief in the night!

Taking a tiny sip, he couldn't help but wonder how further he had left to go.

A while back - he wasn't sure how long - even the alcohol was not enough to dull the ache of emptiness inside him. No-one noticed him anymore; if he passed his former comrades in the street, they did not recognise him. Javert barely recognised himself! The proud Commodore, reduced to the filth of the gutter he had fought so hard to escape. He could not hope to do so again. Each time it began to overwhelm him, he would go to his room, lock the door, and take out his razor. The blood proved to him that he was still alive in this hell.

The cuts on his forearms mapped out the depths of his despair.

When the men came recruiting, offering good pay, no questions asked, Javert signed up without hesitation. He needed the money - but he didn't think it through. He should have known the voyage would have a dubious purpose. He should have realised that no ship with nothing to hide would need to depart so suddenly. He should have... but maybe he did. Maybe he had guessed, but in his drunken stupor, hadn't cared. He couldn't be sure.

It was haunting him.

Now, without the distraction of physical work and the exhaustion it brought, Javert was left with nothing but his own thoughts. nothing but the uncertainty, the fear of what he was becoming.  
Nothing but the black water below.

The cold, distant stars looked down upon him, as he searched the sky for answers. He, Javert, had willingly enlisted on a pirate ship. What would he do if they were attacked by a vessel of the crown? What would he do if they attacked a ship? How could he serve amongst criminals without becoming one himself?

He would rather die.

Javert could feel the darkness surrounding him, calling to him. What was keeping him here anyway? No friends, family long estranged... Nowhere to turn. He had only ever had his duty. Now that was gone too. All he was left with was the empty, purposeless life he was living. Wouldn't it be better to end it now? To stop the pain?

It would only be trading one hell for another.

As if in a trance, he pulled himself up onto the gunwale. The twinkling sea below reflected the fathomless sky, as he took a moment to prepare himself. Closing his eyes, he leant forwards, fighting his body's natural instinct to right itself. It was too late to save him now. 

A brief rush of air, the sensation of falling- then the ice-cold water slammed into him. The impact drove the breath from his lungs, and Javert found himself choking on the salty liquid. He forced his muscles to relax. Then the panic set in. His heart beat frantically. His limbs thrashed against the ocean.  
Gradually, his struggles weakened - until he finally stilled.

His last thought before losing consciousness was that he had taken an eternity to die.


	2. A Short Discourse on the Nature of Sailing Ships

In this modern day and age, the author feels that a short discourse on the nature of sailing ships is required to fully appreciate this tale. The time of sail has come and gone, and little remains of the once-great chariots of the ocean. The majestic bowsprits and figureheads that once thrust defiantly forward over the bows are no more, replaced by soulless points of steel. The mighty hulls, walls of wood that sheltered sailors and cargo lie rotting, abandoned, lost at sea. The poop deck is no more than a joke; few know its position aft of the mainmast, at the stern of a ship. The fo'c's'le - or, more accurately, the forecastle - is rarely recognised by the youth of today; the former battle station of ancient warships, to the fore of each boat, lost to the mists of time that have claimed so much. The gunwales that once encircled all, - foremast, mainmast, and mizzenmast (in that order, from fore to aft) - are broken, little more than firewood.

No more will the ocean-faring vessels run, with the wind behind their sails, across the seven seas. The square rig, sails set athwart - that is to say, across the ship, from port to starboard - was often seen on long voyages between continents, from the relatively small, two masted brigs and brigantines of a few hundred tons, to the mighty barques and full-rigged ships of a few thousand. Unusually, full-rigged ships were square rigged on all three masts; sometimes the rarer jiggermast was also present, behind the mizzenmast. Each mast was fitted in at least three parts, starting from the 'mast', or 'lower', rising to the 'topmast', then the 'topgallant mast' and the optional 'royal mast'. The lowest sail, the course sail of each mast was referred to simply as the 'mainsail' or 'mizzensail', etc, depending on the mast they belonged to; they were also known as the 'forecourse', 'maincourse', 'mizzencourse' and 'jiggercourse' respectively.

It must be noted that the mizzencourse was rarely rigged athwart; it was instead rigged fore and aft, from bow to stern. There was, however, a square rigged sail above this; therefore, the mizzenmast had a yard and a cross-jack yard - the latter of which was the lowest yard of the mast. This is the key difference between a barque and a ship; barques have their mizzenmasts entirely fore and aft rigged.

Sails were named after the mast they were hoisted on, and the section they were hoisted to. There were foretopsails, mizzen topgallant sails, main royal sails, and - above the royals - skysails or moonrakers. Since larger sails were more difficult to handle, the top and topgallant sails were often divided into upper and lower sails. Jibs, set from the foremast down to the bowsprit, and staysails - carried between any mast and the one in front of it, named for the mast they were hoisted on (for example, the main royal staysail would be strung on a stay running from the top of the main royals to the top of the fore topgallant)- were often seen hoisted, to harness as much wind as possible. Sometimes, on calm days, you might also see studdingsails set outboard, on either side of the square sails - except the royals and skysails. If rigged for it, spritsails could also be hung athwart and below the bowsprit. Finally, 'spankers' were carried from the aft-most mast to the stern of the ship.

In the rough speech of sailors, forged in gale-force winds and rough seas as deadly as any war, where a few seconds can mean the difference between life and death, many of these terms are too long. As forecastle is shortened to fo'c's'le, so does sail become s'l. Studdingsail becomes stu'n's'l. Gunwale becomes gun'l.

Arguably the greatest of these giants of the ocean were the tea clippers. They would sail across the ocean, from England to China and back again, with their cargoes of tea - competing to be the first to arrive and sell. The great clipper races ignited fierce rivalry between the crews - roughly 40 men, all expert sailors - and they sacrificed much for the thrill of the chase. Originally, it was a matter of national pride; but when, in 1855, the Americans began to gradually drop out of the English tea trade, the inter-ship races continued. The excitement quickly spread to the general population; as beautiful as they were fast, the tea clippers attracted great crowds to watch them dock. Huge bets were placed on which ship would dock first. The romance of the seas proved irresistible for so many.

The most famous race pitted ten clippers against each other, sailing from Fouchow on the 28th of May 1866. Taeping, Fiery Cross and Serica were the first to depart, but Ariel soon began to catch up. On the 29th of August, 94 days into their voyage, the four were neck and neck at the Azores. As they entered the English Channel, however, Taeping and Ariel pulled ahead. The entire population of London was animated, betting large sums on each ship and talking of little else. An entire month's wages was risked between the crews of Serica and Fiery Cross on which of them would dock first. The leading pair were still level a the mouth of the Thames! Unfortunately for Ariel, Taeping was towed up the river by a slightly faster tug boat. She arrived 20 minutes before Ariel. This journey of epic proportions had taken only 99 days! Serica came into port a few hours later, followed by Fiery Cross less than two days after that.

In what the author considers to be one of the greatest acts of sportsmanship in history, the owners and crews of Taeping and Ariel agreed to share the spoils of victory, and the race was declared a dead heat; after all, it was no fault of one nor a success of the other that ended in defeat or victory. It was not a result of skill, but of something else: luck. The fickle force that can bestow great fortune one moment, then tear it away the next - save life, or take it - or raise a man up from the gutter only to cast him back down again.

Alas, the years of the tea clippers were brief. For only 20 years, these magnificent ships braved the ocean. For only 20 years, crowds gathered to greet them as they came into port. For only 20 years, crews of ordinary men went beyond the call of duty to earn the right to say that they won a clipper race.

But I digress. Smaller, more agile vessels were needed to ply their trade up and down coastlines. Thus, the schooner rig was common in the changeable coastal winds. The schooner - or fore and aft - rig possesses sails set, not athwart, but along the fore and aft line: from the bows to the stern. Possessing the dual advantage of needing only a small crew and the ability to sail close to the wind, they were favoured by tradesmen and privateers alike. They were not, however, limited to the coast; larger vessels could cross the oceans as well as any square-rigged ship could!

One boat in particular must command our interest: the square topsail schooner. As the name may suggest, only the course sails were rigged fore and aft; small square sails were set above them. Built with only a foremast and a mainmast, they were by no means the largest vessels on the seas; they were, however, very fast, and commonly sailed by privateersmen - especially the Baltimore Clipper, a particular variant that had raked masts.


	3. Jean Valjean

Commanding one such clipper was a man, a pirate, one of those men who deem the law unfair, and so choose to uphold their own instead. But he was not an evil man; one might even go so far as to say he was a saint. His crew wre notorious for sparing life; they would attack hard and fast, capturing their prey often without bloodshed, before taking what they desired and leaving. 

There were as many stories of his past as there were stars in the sky. Some said he was born to a wealthy merchant family who disowned him. Some said he was born to a penniless, unmarried mother who turned him out as soon as he was old enough to fend for himself. Some said he had simply fallen to Earth on a star, sprung fully formed from a cave, or else waded out of the sea one day. He did nothing to dispel the aura of mystery surrounding him; indeed, little was known about him at all!

As is common with men of secrecy, rumours abounded in every port. Many were outlandish, nothing more than wild speculation; some, however, did seem to be based in truth. The Captain was widely suspected to not only allow women on board, but to allow them to serve as crew! At first glance, to those at the time, this would seem a foolish policy - but, time and time again, the women of his crew proved their valor. If you had ever chanced to meet him and ask him of this, you might have seen a small, proud smile grace his lips as he told you of how every lady aboard is worth two men: the first for her skill, the second for her determination and courage to be independent - equal to any man, and better than most.

One thing very few people knew was that most of his crew had mutinied. All too eager to believe the best of people, the Captain had ignored the whispers of treachery until it was too late. He, and all still loyal to him, had been set adrift in one of the small boats kept for emergencies; with no food or land anywhere near, they were nonetheless effectively marooned.

When asked later, he would say it was pure good luck that they were able to hail a passing vessel and concoct a believable tale of woe. Promising payment when they docked, they were taken to the nearest port: Port Royal.

As the reader may well have surmised, this mysterious Captain was Jean Valjean.

This fact brings with it the unfortunate possibility that he would be recognised - but he was in need of a ship, a crew, and supplies. Taking the chance was a necessary risk - but "Mr Smith" would not hold up under close scrutiny. And thus, as soon as he procured a suitable vessel, he had sent a group of his remaining men to scrounge enough recruits to be under sail that very night - bringing us up to date with our tale, as Jean Valjean grabbed a rope-end and leapt into the sea in pursuit of a man who thought he could not be saved.

Imagine his surprise when he dragged the unconscious man back on deck, only to discover the one person he feared above all others, the one person who had haunted his footsteps and his dreams all these years: Commodore Javert.


End file.
